3dfx Archive - 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??

ultima

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2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
13.12.12 at 13:45:26

hey guys,

I know, nice topic subject, but that was my question.

in theory, 2 5500 pci cards would equal a 6000, IF you could get it to work together, but that is probably not possible or is it??

Can drivers be "hacked" so that in some way the 6000 drivers could be used for the 5500x2?? (no ATI pun intended)

I would love to know if this is possible AT ALL?? in theory, could it be done?? what would be the most likely way to get it to work??

Will it never work due to there not being a bridge chip like on the 6000, or was that just so the agp port would identify all 4 chips on the same card??

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« Last Edit: 13.12.12 at 15:31:35 by ultima »

3DFX Playrig:

Aerocool Strike-X Air
SuperMicro H8DAE
Dual Opteron 280 @ 2.4Ghz (4 cores)
4 x 1GB PC3200
3DFX Voodoo5 5500MAC PCI
WD 160GB ATA100/133
Diamond MonsterSound MX300
Windows2000 SP4

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Loeschzwerg

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #1 - 13.12.12 at 17:36:10

It is possible, but this would mean a lot of driver re-writing.

No matter how, the biggest problem would be hardware limitations. A normal PCI bus with 33MHz already limits a single 5500 and now would additionally need to carry the traffic between both cards.

What the bridge on the V6k does is to generate a second PCI bus within the card itself to connect alls 4 VSA100 GPUs. It works with 66MHz.

So PCI-X with 66MHz is at least necessary to keep the performance up. But that's not all...

The VSA100 SLI design needs one master GPU with whom all further VSA100 communicate with. That's a lot of traffic between both cards, not to mention additional add-in cards like sound and network.

just a little brainstorm from my side:
- 66MHz PCI bus
- driver needs to declare the master card
- master card gets the image processing data
- master VSA100 needs to share data to 2nd, 3rd and 4th VSA100 (the bottleneck is connection between master VSA100 and 3rd / 4th VSA100)

Would be a nice project.

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ultima

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #2 - 13.12.12 at 18:51:10

that sounds pretty logical to me

but would it be possible to do that with 1 pci and 1 agp?? that would then remove the bandwidth limit of the pci bus, wouldn't it??

I do have a dual P3 1.4Ghz with pci-x 66Mhz slots, even 2 133Mhz if I'm not mistaken, but I thought only the MAC 5500's could run in a 66Mhz slot?? Or is it the only one that can use the 66MNhz slot fully??

But in case of the driver rewriting.......it would be best to use the 6000 drivers wouldn't it?? since that already has that sort of "setup" if you can call it that?!

I mean, if this would work, then in theory, you could add as many 5500's as you want, as the VSA-100 limitation was max 32 chips per card, wasn't it??

Imagine a rig with 1 x agp and let's say 4 pci version, all on a 66Mhz or 133Mhz slot, that would be uber pownage Cheesy

VOODOO style!! Shocked

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« Last Edit: 13.12.12 at 18:53:27 by ultima »

3DFX Playrig:

Aerocool Strike-X Air
SuperMicro H8DAE
Dual Opteron 280 @ 2.4Ghz (4 cores)
4 x 1GB PC3200
3DFX Voodoo5 5500MAC PCI
WD 160GB ATA100/133
Diamond MonsterSound MX300
Windows2000 SP4

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Loeschzwerg

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #3 - 14.12.12 at 08:06:13

ultima wrote on 13.12.12 at 18:51:10:

but would it be possible to do that with 1 pci and 1 agp?? that would then remove the bandwidth limit of the pci bus, wouldn't it??

Should be possible too, just look at the simFUSION 6000q

The Voodoo 5 5500/6000 only work with AGP 1x, which means it is more or less PCI at 66MHz. So we would have more bandwith for the master card, the slave card would be limited to 33MHz.

ultima wrote on 13.12.12 at 18:51:10:

I do have a dual P3 1.4Ghz with pci-x 66Mhz slots, even 2 133Mhz if I'm not mistaken, but I thought only the MAC 5500's could run in a 66Mhz slot?? Or is it the only one that can use the 66MNhz slot fully??

Normal Voodoo 5 5500 PCI also work with 66MHz if put in a PCI-X slot. So two 5500 PCI in two PCI-X slots is the best configuration for this scenario

ultima wrote on 13.12.12 at 18:51:10:

But in case of the driver rewriting.......it would be best to use the 6000 drivers wouldn't it?? since that already has that sort of "setup" if you can call it that?!

I mean, if this would work, then in theory, you could add as many 5500's as you want, as the VSA-100 limitation was max 32 chips per card, wasn't it??

Between 5500 and 6000 there isn't much difference within the drivers. The workload is just splitted to 4 GPUs instead of 2. Same when it comes to AAlchemy drivers. The initialisation routine is the first problem (the driver needs to decide which card is master and which one is slave) and the second one is the data routing on the normal PCI bus. That's at least what I think.

If theses problems are solved 32 GPUs might be possible in theory

But since I'm not a driver developer I can't tell if this is a realistic scenario.

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ultima

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #4 - 14.12.12 at 08:49:00

Quote:

Should be possible too, just look at the simFUSION 6000q The Voodoo 5 5500/6000 only work with AGP 1x, which means it is more or less PCI at 66MHz. So we would have more bandwith for the master card, the slave card would be limited to 33MHz.

Actually, 5500 / 6000 run AGP 2x, so that would be 133Mhz.
So we need someone who can write drivers?? This would be a nice project indeed, this would allow the "small folk" to enjoy the power of a 6000 by combining 2 or more 5500's, that would be awesome in my opinion.

Maybe we can check with AmigaMerlin?? He writes drivers for voodoo5 cards, doesn't he??

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« Last Edit: 14.12.12 at 08:49:13 by ultima »

3DFX Playrig:

Aerocool Strike-X Air
SuperMicro H8DAE
Dual Opteron 280 @ 2.4Ghz (4 cores)
4 x 1GB PC3200
3DFX Voodoo5 5500MAC PCI
WD 160GB ATA100/133
Diamond MonsterSound MX300
Windows2000 SP4

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Loeschzwerg

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #5 - 14.12.12 at 09:08:33

ultima wrote on 14.12.12 at 08:49:00:

Actually, 5500 / 6000 run AGP 2x, so that would be 133Mhz.

Nope only 66MHz Wink

This is because of the SLI Link between the VSA100. A 5500 does have a direct PCI bus between the two VSA100 (it works with 66MHz), the 6000 uses the bridge to generate a PCI bus between all four VSA100 (66MHz too).

The AAlchemy also uses several bridge chips to connect all eight VSA100, but the bus only works with 33MHz internally and that's why it only works with 33MHz to the PCI-X slot of the mainboard. The card can't handle more bandwith.

A single VSA100 is capable of AGP2x speed and compatible to AGP4x voltages (but nothing more).

We are limited to 66MHz Sad

AmigaMerlin or SFFT. But I don't know if they have enough know-how to write a new initialisation routine.

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« Last Edit: 14.12.12 at 09:10:50 by Loeschzwerg »

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ultima

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #6 - 17.12.12 at 08:36:54

OK, I'll take your word on that

you know more about that then me, so....

As for AmgiaMerlin or SFFT, seeing as they have been writing drivers for the 5500's for quite some time now, I'd figure they would know how to do this as well, or at least pinpoint where in the drivers the initialisation route is determined.

Maybe it can be cross-referenced with the voodoo2 drivers, seeing as those would need a "master card" as well, right??

***EDIT***
I was reading up a bit and saw this post:
http://descenttaskforce.forumotion.com/t40-3dfx-voodoo5-6000-voodoo5-5000-world-...

stating:
Quote:

ASUS A7M266-D Rev.1.01 incompatible, Rev.A 3700

seeing as this is my mobo what I use for my 5500AGP, is there any chance this could be incompatible with this project to be?? Or is it just HinT chip incompatible??

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« Last Edit: 17.12.12 at 15:24:40 by ultima »

3DFX Playrig:

Aerocool Strike-X Air
SuperMicro H8DAE
Dual Opteron 280 @ 2.4Ghz (4 cores)
4 x 1GB PC3200
3DFX Voodoo5 5500MAC PCI
WD 160GB ATA100/133
Diamond MonsterSound MX300
Windows2000 SP4

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Loeschzwerg Senior Member Offline AAlchemy PSU maker :-) Posts: 396 Germany -> Bavaria -> Augsburg Gender:	Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI?? Reply #7 - 18.12.12 at 19:04:13 Sure, maybe the Voodoo 2 drivers might be able to give a hint how to get such a thing working. But our driver developers should be able to tell us more about that. As for that board, I think it's only HiNT bridge related. Not because of the voltages but maybe because of some timing issues.
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ultima

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #8 - 18.12.12 at 20:20:51

that's good to hear, cause what I totally forgot, but saw again today when starting to test several cards, is that this board has 1 AGP slot AND 2 66Mhz PCI slots, so if in the future this project gets off the ground and we get it working, I can run 3 Voodoo5's in 1 system.

They'll have more then enough cpu power, as I am currently negotiating about a 2nd XP-M 3000+

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3DFX Playrig:

Aerocool Strike-X Air
SuperMicro H8DAE
Dual Opteron 280 @ 2.4Ghz (4 cores)
4 x 1GB PC3200
3DFX Voodoo5 5500MAC PCI
WD 160GB ATA100/133
Diamond MonsterSound MX300
Windows2000 SP4

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Narmounet

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #9 - 19.12.12 at 11:09:13

I thought about this a long time ago, but I've no idea how drivers works.
But can we imagine that the drivers only sees 2 5500.
It sends the first frame be calculated to the first 5500, the second to the second 5500, third to first 5500, etc. So no more need a master VSA100 which communicate with the 3 others VSA.

And to get the final imagine I don't know the method ; maybe a third card which take the pictures from the framebuffers of the two 5500...

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ultima God Member Offline Always searching Posts: 876 The Netherlands Gender:	Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI?? Reply #10 - 19.12.12 at 11:50:57 in my opinion, if we can get it to work that 1 card is master and 1 is slave, then it shouldn't be too hard to define a 2nd slave either. It should be in a setup like; the 1st chip on the AGP card will be the master and all other VSA-100 chips will reroute to that one, so .....
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ultima

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #11 - 04.01.13 at 09:32:46

I have downloaded the source code drivers for the voodoo5, but those are linux I think

I have also downloaded the newest amigamerlin drivers for voodoo5 and the voodoo2 drivers, to see if I can spot any clues.

I am now very happy, since I traded 1 of my 5500 AGP's with someone for a 5500PCI, so now I have 2 PCI versions and a motherboard that can run both of them on 66Mhz pci buses.

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3DFX Playrig:

Aerocool Strike-X Air
SuperMicro H8DAE
Dual Opteron 280 @ 2.4Ghz (4 cores)
4 x 1GB PC3200
3DFX Voodoo5 5500MAC PCI
WD 160GB ATA100/133
Diamond MonsterSound MX300
Windows2000 SP4

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Loeschzwerg Senior Member Offline AAlchemy PSU maker :-) Posts: 396 Germany -> Bavaria -> Augsburg Gender:	Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI?? Reply #12 - 04.01.13 at 11:44:21 Nice Would be nice if someone could provide us with the W2k/XP driver source.
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ultima

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Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI??
Reply #13 - 04.01.13 at 11:53:24

maybe we can contact AmigaMerlin or SFFT for that?? maybe nice to try on linux 1st?? since that is all open source and should be easier to find??

But can't we use the existing 5500 drivers?? start with the basics with the last WHQL drivers from 3dfx themselves??
Can't we "reverse engineer" those drivers so we get the source code? or am I talking BS now?

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« Last Edit: 04.01.13 at 11:54:58 by ultima »

3DFX Playrig:

Aerocool Strike-X Air
SuperMicro H8DAE
Dual Opteron 280 @ 2.4Ghz (4 cores)
4 x 1GB PC3200
3DFX Voodoo5 5500MAC PCI
WD 160GB ATA100/133
Diamond MonsterSound MX300
Windows2000 SP4

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elfuego Senior Member Offline Searching for V5 6k... Posts: 420 Aachen, Deutschland Gender:	Re: 2 x 5500PCI = 6000 PCI?? Reply #14 - 07.02.13 at 13:34:46 There was a guy on this forum that created his own drivers for V5. Maybe he can jump in?
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